Friday, April 10, 2009

The King Palace

Back when this place was still in its early stages, some of our friends had visited the King Palace for dim sum several times. Each experience, they said, was very good. And so, for dinner, we decided to try them out to see if they were consistently good throughout the entire mealtimes.

The interior was certainly very modern. Specials on different dishes were placed onto a wall. There was also a special meat area which you could order meat from (to go), and over there, you could also see the chefs chopping the chicken and other meats for the diners eating indoors. It is always interesting to see the chefs use their skills to cut pieces of meat :).

We had to wait for a while for our seat, which really didn't matter that much other than the fact that we were cold (and when the front door came in, a sudden breeze of cold air came in). When we were seated, they gave us two small plates of mini appetizers.

Boiled peanuts and spicy marinated cucumbers were the two small plates. They overall were okay- however the cucumber felt like it was spoiled (as in not safe to eat). The vinegar though masked the spoiling flavor. Was it spoiled? Maybe.

Not long after, we ordered, and a plate of chicken came first. We also ordered some fried tofu with mushrooms, a steamed red cod, a oyster pancake, and crab with a ginger and scallion sauce (on sale).

The chicken was relatively bony in most parts, and it was pretty good for the most part, but not the best chicken we had before. The chicken flavor was there, but I would have liked more of it.

Steamed Red Cod came next, and it looked puny! It didn't look at all like what we had ordered (they said two pounds, but this looked like a one pound fish or a one and a quarter pound fish). It tasted good for the most part, but when our friend ate the eyeball, she proclaimed it wasn't fresh. How can a fish taste fresh for most parts and not taste fresh for other parts? Added ingredients?

This mushroom with fried tofu was relatively flavorless. I was expecting more of a punch from the sauce as most restaurants do, but this was very lightly flavored with a hint of the mushroom flavor in the sauce. The tofu was soft on the inside and crispy on the outside, and the enoki mushrooms were not overcooked. Overall, the main components were good, but the flavor portion of the dish, the sauce, was very bland.

Lastly, the oyster pancake came, and the first thought of it? BURNT! Yes, the bottom portion (not shown in the photo) was burned. Not good. The burnt flavor went all over the dish, and basically ruined the entire dish. With every bite, there was some burnt flavor.

And for your information, this had eggs, oysters, green onions, and some glutinous rice flour (which makes up the pancake part). There was also a sauce to the side which made this dish have flavor. Other wise, it would have been very bland!

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But how about the crab we ordered? It never came. All the kitchen was pumping out was another type of crab- the pepper salt fried crab. And they never got to making ours. When we declined the order, the waiter was shocked. He said, "Why not have it when it is so cheap?"

What does cheap equal in our minds when he said it? Cheap=BAD QUALITY. No meat, all shell.

We were pretty mad by this point. Usually, we never cancel any dishes before feeling full. But we waited for that crab till we finished with no response and still feeling hungry! No thanks please. We would rather go home to eat more food.

What made us get even madder after the crab situation? There was a special customer sitting right next to us who was being pampered like having a special butler :). What ever he requested, the waiters brought to him. And the waiters treated us nothing like him. I'd say this place's service for us (for the entire time we were there) was even worse than Face Cafe, a restaurant that shouldn't even be compared to this level of restaurants.

So...overall? Bad service, okay food. The food is underseasoned and nothing really that special about it. It's just yet another restaurant that is good at dim sum, but not at dinner. Just like what Full House used to be back in 2008 (but now positive in both ends 2009 onward).

2 comments:

Anonymous
said...

Good Review. Many of the times i came though, the experience was different from yours. We had great service and the food was great. When it was still new they had this wonderful menu with lots of food i never heard of like a crispy grilled pork on a skewer with a honey glaze. Unfortunately, they changed the menu, i think it was because of the poor business and now its so busy. I guess the traditional chinese menu really attracts customer. -Kimberly